In rowing, the study states that it may take up to 7.5% of propulsive force to overcome up to 40m lateral displacement over a 2K race. That is potentially a huge wildcard when you see elite finals being decided by a fraction of a second such as in Rio.

It would be interesting to see if there’s any potential correlation on championship times at high/low latitudes, or for example if rowers who train at relatively high latitudes (NZ? GB?) experience any advantages/disadvantages in steering or compensation when competing at low latitudes or in the opposite hemisphere, and vice versa. It seems like the effect over 2k would be big enough to be able to measure some of these things.

Likely not relevant for CrossFit due to the short distances involved and the rounding of times to the nearest second, but maybe I can blame the Coriolis effect the next time the wallball wobbles and hits me in the face?